Joseph Gerth | Who enabled a climate of harassment at Kentucky Capitol?

Sep. 22, 2013

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The Courier-Journal

Bobby Sherman

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On Friday afternoon, the burgeoning sexual harassment scandal in Frankfort claimed its second person.

I hesitate to use the word “victim” here, as the victims in this case are the women who allegedly have been groped, grabbed, butt-slapped and generally treated like playthings, rather than the professionals they are.

Two Fridays ago, it was state Rep. John Arnold, the Sturgis Democrat, whose alleged boorish behavior set this whole thing off. Two, then three, women came forward and accused him of sexually harassing them.

Last week, the Friday departure was longtime Legislative Research Commission director Bobby Sherman, who, at age 61, walked away from his $195,000 per year job, saying that after more than 30 years in state government, it was time to leave.

Easy come, easy go.

In his resignation letter, Sherman said that he has been thinking of retiring for some time and he would have quit earlier had it not been for the fact that he wanted to oversee the Arnold investigation, which began earlier this year.

He didn’t mention the fact that his own conduct — both in allegedly having an affair with a staffer and in investigating the claims against Arnold — had come into question.

Sherman may have been considering retirement but his departure has all the hallmarks of a forced resignation.

It came at 3:56 p.m. on a Friday. (That’s the oldest trick in the P.R. book — you wait until the end of the day Friday in hopes that reporters will be too busy to notice. This never works.)

Then, Senate President Robert Stivers had zero, zilch, nada, nothing to say about the retirement of Sherman, who was LRC director for 30 years and just five years ago was so valuable that he commanded a 47 percent raise.

House Speaker Greg Stumbo issued a one-sentence statement on Sherman’s departure: “We thank Bobby for his many years of service, both as a staff person and as the director.”

(Personal note: Dear Boss, when I leave my job, hopefully many years from now, on the email announcing my departure, please say more than, “We thank Joe for his many years of service.”)

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Thomas Clay, the lawyer representing some of the women who have filed complaints and are angling to file a lawsuit against the LRC for letting the sexual harassment issue fester, isn’t necessarily buying that Sherman is leaving on the best of terms.

“I don’t know if he resigned from pressure from the legislative leaders who are his bosses, or if he is concerned about what may yet be revealed about the culture up there,” Clay told my colleague, Tom Loftus. “... But I can say I’m skeptical about his stated reason.”

Several lawmakers have now spoken up and said it was a mistake in 2007 not to investigate the allegations that Sherman’s alleged affair with a staff member was creating a hostile work environment for others in the office.

In a letter to Clay on Thursday, Sherman said the LRC acted quickly after his clients, Yolanda Costner and Cassaundra Cooper, filed formal complaints in February and took actions in an effort to keep Arnold away from the women.

But in fact, Costner first complained to State Rep. John Will Stacy, then a member of House Democratic Leadership, that Arnold had grabbed her underwear while walking up steps at the state Capitol Annex as far back as 2010.

The public needs to know now if Sherman is just a scapegoat and if legislators were complicit in, or even responsible for, creating a culture where workplace affairs between bosses and subordinates could flourish and sexual harassment was tolerated.

Stivers has called for a recording of a closed-door LRC hearing on Sept. 4 to be made public. Stumbo opposed holding the meeting in private to begin with. That recording needs to be released to help determine if others are responsible — if so, they can be held accountable.